to be sick of DP's ex wife's demands

[forestcookie]

The dc live with her primarily but DP does loads. He takes the dc to school 2 mornings a week so she can go to work early and miss the traffic, he has to be at her house for 7.45am. He picks the children up once or twice a week, depending if it's his weekend or not - has them EOW for 3 nights. He would pick them up more but he works late 3 nights a week. He is on 25k, she is on something like 40k but she has standard office hours - 9-5, no late nights etc. He is in a tiny rented 1 bedroom flat, she has a large 3 bedroom house with a garden, driveway etc. She also gets child benefit and UC help, DP doesn't see any of that.

DP has just given her £300 towards their swimming lessons and summer holiday clubs - his "half", IMO she should pay more because she earns more, and I don't know why he is paying towards childcare because UC pay for it, but he didn't want her to kick off.

Now he usually picks up the children on Wednesday nights from after school club, again this enables her to work. She has just told him that tomorrow night she is going to see a friend for dinner and won't be back until 9.30pm. DP usually likes to leave her house by 9pm so he can get home and have dinner and prepare for work the next day. DP has told her this and she has kicked off saying she doesn't have a life or time to socialise (she does). I don't think she should be going out that night anyway, because DP has to be in her house without her which I don't really like. He has offered to have the kids overnight Wednesday nights but the dc don't want this.

AIBU to tell DP to put his foot down? He is knackered all the time from working late or looking after the DC while she gets to earn more and get home late as long as he is looking after them!

I think you need to take a step back OP and consider if this relationship is right for you, instead of trying to dictate to your partner what he should and shouldn't do for his kids. His ex wifes finances are none of your business, just as if you were living together your finances would be none of her business.

Take a step back and also take a look at your own expectations for a relationship. Your partner isn't even close to doing even 50/50 care and you are calling it 'loads'. Its not loads but it does sound like hes doing the best he can with the situation he is in. However you seen to want to divert his time and money away from his kids and towards yourself and thats not on.

Your DP is really not doing much at all so you would be ridiculous to tell him to out his foot down, which you shouldn't do regardless as it's none of your business.

Reading your updates it sounds like you are coming at this from jealousy of him being around her more than anything else.

He's not doing enough imo.
But you need to go find someone else with no kids.

Well he already pays £0 child maintenance monthly and OP thinks its completely unreasonable for him to pay towards holiday clubs or swimming so I'm guessing her ideal is £0. She doesn't want him caring for them at ex house or doing drop offs, feels he's overworked and never gets time off, so the 3 nights EOW or maybe less.

He's talking bullshit about cms telling him he's not working enough. Cms will take money out of peoples benefits when not working.

He's their parent, he should be responsible for half the child care costs, he works too, just because she organises the childcare doesn't mean it's solely her responsibility, presumably he's not on annual leave all summer holidays to cover childcare?

It isn't that simple though is it? That would mean the OP upsetting the apple cart which would lead to the ex disliking her and if she was so inclined, passing that on to the kids. Which would then cause OP's DP resenting her 'rescuing' him. It is far too complicated and absolute madness to take it on.

I think you are looking at it the wrong way.

Ultimately he has two lives that require resources. One his kids/ex wife. The other with you.

The problem is in your head you are setting up the ex. wife and kids as direct competition with yourself for resources and anything they get is something that you don't.

Don't think like this.

Think about the lifestyle you want and the resources you both need to contribute to achieve it. Then both sides should provide those resources (time/money/assets etc).

If he is not capable of providing those resources you want you then choose whether or not you want to continue the relationship on that basis.

Also, don't accept excuses as to why he can't do x y and z because of other commitments in terms of resources. Either he can commit to the amount of resources you need to have a live together. Or he can't and you would be better off finding someone else.

I seen the heading and thought you would get a hard time unfairly .

I now see you may at get a hard time and it will be fair .

ex wife has kids full time except 1 weekend a month ?
the dad takes kids to school two morning and spends time two nights? Big wow its called parenting .

Every parent is tired from work and kids

Ah, now we’re getting to the crux of it…

DP lives about 30 mins away from them , ex wife has much lower commuting costs etc as a result.

What? 😮 Commuting costs are for travelling to work, not for looking after your own children. Your posts are getting more silly. If he's feeding you this sob story you really need to start engaging your brain. Lower commuting costs 😂 How about higher housing costs?

Men like the OP's DP have no business getting into new relationships before they have sorted out the last one. It places the new woman in a lose lose situation from the off. Especially if they go into rescuer mode. It NEVER ends well for her even when she thinks it does.

Most probably!

Yes the ex being so so sexy and trying to seduce him in her towel. What a tart tut tut

ops just a 🦇 💩 gf not even a partner. Two years living apart trying to interfere into a man’s custody with his ex when he pays no child support. What a prize… 🏆

I don’t have kids and want a man to prioritise me and not be in contact with his ex, which is why I don’t date men with kids for precisely this reason. Simple.

It’s completely unreasonable for me to want a man with kids to redirect some his resources away from them for my benefit. So I just stay clear of them altogether as I wouldn’t want to be with a man who is a deadbeat.

I hope OP is not wanting kids with this man then because If he can’t afford or accommodate his own kids now, he obviously can’t have afford to have any with them.

I wish instead of single mums who are actually working and looking after their kids being scapegoated every two seconds, society would focus more on the evils of deadbeat dads who would prefer their exes and the state to support their kids instead of being a proper father. And then have the nerve to go on and have more kids in many cases.

Women like OP are part of the problem, they enable men like this. Can you imagine how much worse Op would be if she had kids with this man?

None of this is your business - you don't even live together! How dare you presume to decide when one of their children should stop swimming lessons?!! My kids continued after they'd learned the basics - it made them stronger more competent swimmers!!

The mum's disposable income is none of your fucking business either!

Paying over "what he has to" isn't a crime!! It's what any decent parent would do.

You are not coming across well here!!! What is your 'partner' doing to improve his income?

actually due to the nature of his job he isn't working a huge amount in the school holidays. He is looking after the children for 2 weeks over the summer holidays. Ex still doesn't have enough leave for the rest of the holidays so is taking 2 weeks off then the rest will be holiday clubs or her Mum. DP could easily have them for another week but I don't think Ex wants that so she is insisting he pays for holiday clubs for some days even though he isn't working.

Its pretty obvious that the kids going to a different swimming pool would save them BOTH money to be spent on other things

Try reading that again. Idiot 😂

I don’t think he does loads, sounds like he does very little compared to the mum.

also, none of your business.

You speak as if you would prefer his children not to exist OP, ergo you are not cut out to be a step parent and this is not the relationship for you.

*DP's wage is relevant because I don't think he should be paying half of the costs , he should be paying proportionate to his wage.

When people split and have 50/50 care, each parent pays 50% of the kids costs regardless of how much the difference in wages is. Making it proportional depends on each person being honest and being ok disclosing their wage which isn’t common in a split. (I know that you can sometimes estimate your ex’s income from the CMS amount paid but not everyone is an employee etc)

Considering that he’s not paying any CM because of his low wage I think that ex isn’t unreasonable to ask for 50% and your partner isn’t unreasonable to pay. Is this issue something that he’s unhappy about or you ?

First, you can't tell him to do anything. It's 100% not your place to do that.

Second, you need to separate out the issues.
Being uncomfortable about him being in the house with his ex/her showering when he's there etc, that's about your boundaries and what you consider acceptable in your relationship.
If you don't like it, talk to him about it and provide solutions you'd be happy with rather than just telling him you're unhappy.

The separate issue of finances isn't your business really, but as you've raised it here - you seem annoyed that her life is 'nicer' than his (mentioning her mortgage, 3 bed house, salary, office hours job etc) but presumably she's worked to set herself up that way.

He is making choices - he chose to earn less to have more favourable hours, but in doing so, he's chosen to make it so he can only afford a small flat while knowing he has 2 children.

He could have applied for a different job, different sector, been more picky on jobs. I work for an insurance company and there are departments that earn £23k starting salary for answering the phones, so if he really wanted to, he could earn more.

Also, paying 'more than he's supposed to' is an awful argument to make. Kids don't cost less because you earn less. Maintenance is the minimum you can get away with paying - any decent father would want to pay more.
What that money is used for is between him and his ex.
I wouldn't be surprised if he was agreeing with her about the swimming lessons then moaning to you about the costs - don't assume you know everything.

As the finances bother you, don't at any point combine finances or get married.

It's none of your business. He's doing less than 50% childcare.

Have your reading comprehension skills deserted you today? She said as he’s the non resident parent he should be paying more as he has the chance to up his career and hours. She’s not said at all that ‘men should be earning more than women’ 🙄

Now they are divorced, the notion of paying according to what you earn is irrelevant. They are as much his children as hers and he should be paying 50% - she can't be expected to prop him up financially indefinitely.

Similar vein, whether or not she has family support for 'her part' of the childcare is irrelevant. 50% of the childcare is down to him to organise. Otherwise again, ex wife (via her mum) is propping up your DP - why on earth should they?

It feels like you are jealous she has a higher income and better quality of life and think that because of that, he should subsidise her. Unfortunately it's not the way it works.

They are his children!

It is normal for a parent regardless of sex to parent their children when required including school holidays. (My DP is doing 3 weeks.)

My DD also goes to holiday clubs when one of us can be off to look after her. The reason for this is during term time she is randomly sick so we can't use all our holiday up in case.

In the past I've looked after nieces and nephews in school holidays because their parents ran out of holiday due to using it up in term time due to sickness.

In regards to the swimming pool - we took our DD to a pool where she decided the water is too cold and refused to engage with the swimming lessons, so now she hasn't been swimming for a year as the nearest pool with a warm pool was being fixed. She is now going to have lessons that cost more in the warmer pool.